Deaths | Elsewhere

Deaths - Elsewhere

March 10, 2008|By The New York Times

Richard J. Durrell

FAIRFIELD, Conn. -- Richard J. Durrell, the founding publisher of People magazine, died Friday of lung cancer. He was 82.

Durrell's long career at the magazine publishing giant Time Inc. began in 1950 when he answered a newspaper ad for a circulation newsstand representative in Minneapolis. He later worked in advertising for both Time and Life magazines before being named publisher of People.

A blend of pictures, celebrity features and human-interest articles, People hit the streets in March 1974. The magazine was an instant hit among readers.

Durrell, who retired in 1983, was a baseball's throw away from an entirely different career. After graduating from high school in Minneapolis in 1942, he enlisted and served three years with the Marines and spent time in occupied Japan. Upon his return to the United States, he was offered professional baseball contracts with the Brooklyn Dodgers and the Chicago Cubs.

Instead, he chose to attend the University of Minnesota, from which he graduated in 1948. He married Jacquelyn C. Dow in 1949.

R. Palmer Baker Jr.

NEW YORK -- R. Palmer Baker Jr., a lawyer who was instrumental in the creation of a leading cancer-research institution as well as organizations involved in criminal-justice issues and the treatment of addiction, died Monday of unknown causes. He was 89.

From 1995 to 2005, Baker was chairman of the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research, a Manhattan-based organization with nine research centers in seven countries.

Baker also was involved in the creation of the Vera Institute of Justice, a nonprofit research and policy organization that looks at issues such as prison violence and parole policies.

He helped create and then served as chairman for the first of Vera's 17 spinoff corporations, Manhattan Bowery, which addresses addiction problems. In his 70s and 80s, Baker was chairman of the Argus Community, a South Bronx nonprofit group that serves people who are mentally ill, addicted or homeless. He also was a trustee of NewYork Presbyterian Hospital and of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Baker was born in Troy, N.Y., on March 4, 1918. He received his bachelor's and law degrees at Harvard and served in the Navy during World War II, rising to lieutenant commander.